what happened to aiyana joneswhat happened to aiyana jones

Sarah Cwiek joined Michigan Radio in October 2009. According to reports, seconds after entering the house, Weekley fired the fatal shot. Aiyana was severely burned and then shot in the head and neck by an unidentified police officer standing on the porch. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot loses reelection bid, Fiery train crash in Greece kills dozens, many of them students. Forget about it. January 30, 2015 / 4:13 PM . Jones and two other men known as Lil James and Dirt rode along for JeReans ass-whipping. Weekley, a member of an elite police unit, was the first officer through the door during a chaotic . Grover 08:10, 10 June 2014 (UTC) Reply . There are no fewer than two TV dramas, two documentaries, and three reality programs being filmed here. We believe today's settlement is fair because it balances the needs of Aiyana's family and our responsibility for the city's finances. The Packard plant, where we came across this fashion shoot, has been smoldering for decades.In any case, Detroit began its long precipitous decline during the 1950s, precisely when the cityand the United Stateswas at its peak. Im alive. Blame the Federal Reserve. JeReans mother drove as he gurgled in the backseat. The grenade landed so close to Aiyana that it burned her blanket.. You might blame Coleman Youngthe citys first black mayorand his culture of cronyism. They killed a child and then they lied about it.. Mertilla Jones was held overnight by Detroit police and then released. We're a nonprofit (so it's tax-deductible), and reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget. Home. But is she responsible for police officers with broken computers in their squad cars, firefighters with holes in their boots, ambulances that arrive late, a city that cant keep its lights on and leaves its vacant buildings to the arsonists match, a state government that allows corpses to stack up in the morgue, multinational corporations that move away and leave poisoned fields behind, judges who let violent criminals walk the streets, school stewards who steal the childrens milk money, elected officials who loot the city, automobile executives who couldnt manage a grocery store, or Wall Street grifters who destroyed the economy and left the nations children with a burden of debt? Adam Rose/Netflix In addition to traveling, the Chicago-based pair is looking at a potential move once Iyanna, 27, heads back to school to get her master's degree. It was 12:40 am on Sunday, May 16, 2010. "(Jones is) the one who gave (Owens) the gun to kill their brother. You could blame it on the gas shocks of the 70s that opened the door to foreign car competition. In this current era, what she calls her "most confident" yet, she's channeling none other than her go-getter Bel-Air character Hilary Banks . Weekley insisted he accidentally pulled the trigger during a struggle with Aiyana's grandmother. The lawsuit asserts that police were outside of the home where they "blindly fired random shots," and one of the bullets fatally struck the 7-year-old child in the neck. Scott said a civil suit had been filed and an appeal made to US attorney general Eric Holder to pursue a case for the violation of Aiyanas civil rights. The raid took place at about 12:30 a.m. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2023 demands. Aiyana was buried in a white casket which was driven to her grave site by a horse-drawn carriage. Cargill said because of COVID-19 restrictions, she was unable to attend Jones' parole hearings to contest his release. Im trying to find him, Sheffield complained. Then Huff got killed. For years it was the all-but-official policy of the newspapers to ignore the black city, since the majority of readers lived in the predominantly white suburbs. Al Sharpton spoke her eulogy. My daughter got love, honor, and respect. Forget what you saw, little man. I would have waited until the morning when the guy went to the liquor store to buy a quart of milk. Jones, 25, a slight man with frizzy braids, wore a dingy T-shirt. No one cared much about Detroit or its industrial suburbs until the Dow collapsed, the chief executives of the Big Three went to Washington to grovel, and General Motors declared bankruptcy100 years after its founding. The kids are dropping like fliesespecially young black malesand hes got nothing but useless words.. His weapon fired a single shot, the bullet striking Aiyana in the head and exiting her neck. Even in Detroit, a predominantly black city. Aiyana Mo'Nay Stanley-Jones (July 20, 2002 May 16, 2010) was a seven-year-old African-American girl from Detroit's East Side who was shot in the neck and killed by police officer Joseph Weekley during a raid conducted by the Detroit Police Department's Special Response Team targeting a suspect in the apartment a floor above Jones' on May 16, 2010. Jones was born on July 20, 2002, to Charles Jones and Dominika Stanley in Detroit, Michigan. Evans told me then that major crimes were routinely underreported by 20 percent. What the fuck you looking at?. Responding to a breaking-and-entering and shots-fired call at 3:30 a.m., Officer Brian Huff, a 12-year veteran, walked into that dark house. Ive seen him in the faces of soldiers when I was covering the Iraq War. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. In 2010 Aiyana MoNay Stanley-Jones, a seven-year-old African American girl, was accidentally shot and killedduring a raid that was conducted by the Detroit,Michigan Police Departments Special Response Team. You might say that the homicide of Aiyana is the natural conclusion to the disease from which she suffered, Schmidt told me. Aiyana Jones' step aunt Kayia White and step mom Dominique Simpson, right, sit on the front porch next to a blood spattered sofa in Detroit on . As for the videotape of the killing, Geoffrey Fieger said he did not have it. [51] She was buried on the grounds. Police fired a flash grenade through the front window. But our ammos so bad, we cant do ballistics testing. May 16, 2010, 7-year-old Aiyana was asleep on her couch, wrapped in her Hannah Montana blanket. [CHECK OUT A SLIDESHOW OF ABANDONED HOUSES ON ONE BLOCK IN DETROIT]I keep calling about these falling-down houses, but the city never comes, she said. Al Sharpton delivered the eulogy, though his heart did not seem to be in it. What does the science say about the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic? Neighbor Paul Jameson, a former soldier whose wife had called in the break-in to 911, said the rookies ran toward the house and opened fire after Huff was shot. Police officers came from Canada and across Michigan. Testifying at the New Prospect Missionary Baptist Church.Stand at the corner of Lillibridge Street and Mack Avenue and walk a mile in each direction from Alter Road to Gratiot Avenue (pronounced Gra-shit). [2] Her death drew national media attention[3] and led U.S. Representative John Conyers to ask U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder for a federal investigation into the incident. We hope this resolution will provide everyone involved a measure of closure," Detroit Corporation Counsel Lawrence Garcia said in a statement, according to the Detroit News. . AIYANAS FAMILY retained Geoffrey Fieger, the flamboyant, brass-knuckled lawyer who represented Dr. Jack Kevorkiana.k.a. "But I can tell you this: If anyone is looking for a scapegoat for justice, then you've got one here as owner, coach and quarterback. There was no note. He was shot in the head and killed last year. Its too late.. It is the home of mass-production, of very high wages and colossal profits, of lavish spending and reckless instalment-buying, of intense work and a large and shifting labour-surplus, British historian and MP Ramsay Muir wrote in 1927. Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights. But defense attorney Steve Fishman says Jones has no credibility because she's told different stories about what happened. [11], The jury claimed that race did not affect the decision of their verdict. The posse allegedly included Aiyanas father, Charles C.J. Jones. They were conducting a police raid in search of a murder suspect who lived at that address -- and being filmed for a reality TV show in the process -- when Officer Joseph Weekley accidentally fired his gun. [50][bettersourceneeded] The casket was white and was afterwards driven to the grave by horse-drawn carriage. Go. He wore a gold bracelet as thick as a gymnasium rope. Was Detroit an outlier or an epicenter? What killed Aiyana is what killed the people in New Orleans and the rider on the transit in Oakland, and thats police bullets and police arrogance and police cover-up, Geoffrey Fieger said. A good kid with average grades, JeRean went to Southeastern High, which is situated in an industrial belt of moldering Chrysler assembly plants. Its always like that. Many are as fucked up and sad as Aiyanas. During the second trial, Judge Cynthia Gray Hathaway dismissed the most serious charge, involuntary manslaughter, saying there was insufficient evidence. Aiyana Stanley-Jones was seven years old and asleep on a couch with her grandmother when Detroit police raided their east side home looking for a murder suspect in 2010. I can accept the shooting was a mistake, Jones said about his daughters death as a bleary-eyed Stanley sat motionless next to him. But the people of Lillibridge Street still look like theyve been picked up by their hair and dropped from the rooftop. It is like that all over Detroit, where whole blocks regularly go dark with no warning or any apparent pattern. While other American metropolises have gotten control of their murder rate, Detroits remains where it was during the crack epidemic. Instead of being protected, communities are treated like the enemy, the report found with a disproportionate effect on communities of color. Sharptons full of shit, said Cargill, a brassy 39-year-old who works as a stock clerk at Target. But she added: "I hope he does the right thing when he gets outand triesto help these other young Black males out here;tell them about lifeand tell them what he did.". At its peak popularity, 810 fires were set in a three-day span. Based on the findings from a report released by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in June 2014 and entitled War Comes Home: The Excessive Militarization of American Policing, which looked at thousands of documents from police departments across the country, Ezekiel Edwards, the director of the ACLUs criminal law reform project, says needlessly deploying Swat teams is part of a trend among nationwide police forces which increasingly [see] themselves as military tactical units. You should go, he said to me, shattering the silence with a wave of his hand. [16], Aiyana Jones was the daughter of Charles Jones and Dominika Stanley. Outside court, a spokesman for Aiyana's family criticized the judge for her comments. In 2010, a 7-year-old girl, Aiyana Stanley-Jones, was slaughtered during a police raid of her home in Detroit. Lyvonne Cargill wears a shirt that honors her son, JeRean Blake Nobles. A dollhouse sits in an empty lot not far from where Aiyana was shot by the police officers storming her home.It was a total fuck-up, the official said. But Officer Joseph Weekley accidentally shot Aiyana in the head, killing her. Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation. [47], On September 29, Weekley's lawyer asked the judge for a mistrial, citing Mertilla Jones's conduct on the stand the week before. If that isnt a record for any major metropolis, it is certainly a record for Detroit. Completed in 1917, the school, attended by white students at the time, was considered so far out in the wilds that its athletic teams took the nickname Jungaleers.. Then JeRean was murdered. Then, realizing that sounded implausible, they said shed brushed the gun as she ran past the door. The walls are covered with photographs of Geoffrey Fieger. I saw him in the face of my sisters daughter, who died from a heroin overdose in a suburban basement near the interstate, weeks after I moved back to Michigan with my wife to raise our daughter and take a job with the Detroit News. JeRean knew badness was on its way and called his mother to come pick him up. Aiyana Stanley-Jones was seven years old and asleep on a couch with her grandmother when Detroit police raided their east side home looking for a murder suspect in 2010. The manslaughter trial was declared a mistrial. First published on January 30, 2015 / 4:13 PM. A small crowd of agitated black people was gathered on the sidewalk. I was thinking that, she said with tears. And TV may have needed some pyrotechnics. The house next door to his is rubble smelling of burnt pine, pissed on by the spray cans of the East Warren Crips. "[67], Last edited on 17 February 2023, at 18:19, Lists of killings by law enforcement officers in the United States, "Detroit police outline final moments of Aiyana's life", "State to Probe Police Killing of Girl in Detroit", "Conyers seeks federal probe of Aiyana's death", "Aiyana Stanley-Jones Update: Mistrial declared in manslaughter trial of Detroit cop in death of 7-yr.-old girl", "Judge dismisses involuntary manslaughter charge against Detroit", "Manslaughter charge dismissed in cop's shooting of girl", "Charge dismissed in Detroit police shooting - the Washington Post", "Second mistrial declared in fatal shooting of Aiyana Stanley-Jones by Detroit police officer Joseph Weekley", "Second mistrial in case of Detroit cop who accidentally killed child", "Charges Dismissed Against Joseph Weekley, Cop Who Fatally Shot Sleeping 7-Year-Old [UPDATE]", "Detroit children dying in culture of violence", "Where's the outrage? The city filled with people from all over the world: Arabs, Appalachians, Poles, African Americans, all in their separate neighborhoods surrounding the factories. I called the fire department to ask for its statistics. Her death drew national media attention and led U.S. Representative John Conyers to ask U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder for a federal . Even the beavers have returned.The daughter of an autoworker and a home nurse, McNeal grew up in the promise of the black middle class that Detroit once offered. Then she introduced me to her 14-year-old son DeErion, whose remains sat in an urn on the mantel. I get no sleep. [2], After a one-year internal and federal investigation, on October 4, 2011, a grand jury indicted Weekley on involuntary manslaughter and reckless endangerment with a gun. The story rated three paragraphs in the daily papers, and the media never followed up. Weekley's first trial ended in a mistrial in June 2013. People call it police brutality. The number was actually 375. [12][17][18] Officer Weekley claimed that the flash grenade subsequently blinded his view of the person on the couch in the living room. On the morning of May 16, a Detroit police officer fatally shot 7-year-old Aiyana Stanley-Jones in the throat during a police raid on her home. WRSX 91.3 Port Huron is off the air due to network issues. [12] Charles Jones, Aiyana's father, wore a black suit, pink tie and pink handkerchief in remembrance of his daughter as pink was her favorite color. The day I visited, a Hollywood starlet (PDF) was tailing the doctor, studying for her role as the medical examiner in ABCs new Detroit-based murder drama Detroit 1-8-7. Aiyana Jones settlement On April 4, Attorney Geoffrey Fieger announced that the City of Detroit had agreed to an $8.2 million settlement in the 2010 slaughter of Aiyana Jones, 7, by another joint task force incuding Detroit Police Officer Joseph Weekley during a military-style assault on her grandmother Mertilla Jones' home. She was seven years old. Tens of thousands of them, hundreds of thousands. He said. It's hurting me. When I moved back to Detroit two years ago, I profiled a firehouse on the East Side. A bunch of lazy, uneducated blue-collar incompetents. Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox. Its going to stop, he promised. . They turned on the lights and saw that she had been shot.. In Los Angeles, by comparison, the unsolved-murder rate is 22 percent. I began to get calls from reporters around the world wondering what Detroit was like, what was happening here. "This was an assassination by video," said Roland Lawrence as he and others watched a small plane . JeRean might have thought it was funny to see a grown man driving a moped. WHat actually happened to this little girl? Even Time bought a house on the East Side last year for $99,000. Chauncey Owens, the uncle wanted on murder charges, was said to be going in and out of the house as normal and could have been apprehended during the day. The department was also cited for excessive force after people died in lockup and at the hands of rogue cops. Two days later, on May 16, police arrived at the house where Aiyana Jones lived, hoping to find Owens. These girls are the lucky ones. Louis Miriani, the last Republican mayor of Detroit, who served from 1957 to 1962, was sent to federal prison for tax evasion when he couldnt explain how he made nearly a quarter of a million dollars on a reported salary of only $25,000. (And that statistic is true; I checked.). According to the police, Officer Joseph Weekley was the first police officer to enter the home. The dismissal was at the request of Wayne County prosecutor Kym Worthy, who called the decision, which by law cannot be appealed, unfortunate. In the process, the gun belonging to police officer Joseph Weekley . [34][35], Weekley's first trial ended in a mistrial in June 2013. Whenever I see a person who died of violence or misadventure, I think about the dead man with the open eyes on the dirty floor of the liquor store. In Detroit, the official response time of an ambulance to a 911 call is 12 minutes. Inside, splayed on the floor underneath the rack of snack cakes near the register, was a black man in a pool of blood. The man stopped, turned, and pulled a gun. Then came the homicide-by-cop of little Aiyana. The grenade landed so close to Aiyana that it burned her blanket. Folks want to blame Aiyana's "crime ridden" neighborhood for her death. At the prosecutors request, Hathaway dismissed the last charge against Joseph Weekley. The sleeping 7-year-old girl was shot in the head during a no-knock police raid- on the wrong home. The team, which had received intelligence that at least one rifle was in the house,wasaccompanied by a crew from the cable TV show, "First 48.". He gives details of the way streets look like at night, and gives a captivating detail of girl's father suffering from insomnia. As officer Joseph Weekley walks free, another community is demanding answers about the increasing militarisation of law enforcement. That year, the police said there were 306 homicidesuntil I began digging. The Jones family contends that the shot that killed Aiyana was fired from outside the house, and that the police eventually caught the homicide suspect, Chauncey L. Owens, at a different address . I think its evil. His body was transferred to Dr. Schmidt and the Wayne County morgue. [12] She was one of three children of the couple and had four halfsiblings. This dental device was sold to fix patients' jaws. But McNeal messed upshe admits as much. ", The mother of Jones' victim, Lyvonne Cargill, said: "I'm stressed thinking about that man coming home." Weekley, who retired from the police department in 2019,claimed Mertilla Jones grabbed his rifle, causing it to discharge. "[27] His trial was scheduled for October[28] and finally took place in June 2013 but resulted in a deadlocked jury. In August 2014, he was convicted and sentenced to a year in prison on four counts, including false imprisonment and felony cruelty to children. Even on Lillibridge Street, the outrage has died down. He might have smirked. What the hell you doing up here for? I get no sleep. By parental neglect? A member of JROTC, he was on his way to the military recruitment office after senior prom and commencement. The Detroit Police Department was in search of a murderer, and mistakenly raided Aiyana's home. There were even toys on the lawn. Shoddily equipped firemen face some 500 arsons a month.Detroit has been synonymous with arson since the 80s, when the city burst into flames in a pre-Halloween orgy of fire and destruction known as Devils Night. I asked him if the way he was raising his daughter, the people he exposed her to, or the neighborhood where they livedwith its decaying houses and liquor storesmay have played a role. Weekley, 38, was charged with involuntary manslaughter and careless discharge of a firearm causing death, a misdemeanor in the death of Aiyana. [53] Two days after Jones's death, on May 18, 2010, attorney Geoffrey Fieger filed lawsuits on behalf of her family against A&E and the police. I mean, hiring the Rosa Parks carriage?, I dont owe Sheffield shit, says Jones. Gibson bonded out last January and actually showed up for his trial in circuit court on February 17. But JeRean never went to prom, much less the Afghanistan theater, because he couldnt clear the killing fields of Detroit. The blood was congealing into a pancake on the dirty linoleum. Robert Bobb was hired in 2009 as the emergency financial manager and given sweeping powers to balance the books. "They said he'll be on parole until 2030, and he or his family can't be around my family. Jones, too, later became a person of interest in JeReans murderhe allegedly went along for the ridebut Jones denies it, and hes lawyered up and moved to the suburbs. The crime most likely happened at the . Terms of Service apply. Clutching his juice in one hand and two dollars in the other, JeRean staggered across Mack Avenue and collapsed in the street. The jury stall resulted in seven voting "not guilty" and five voting "guilty". A slender, pimply faced kid, JeRean was not an intimidating figure. Weekley stated, "A woman inside grabbed my gun. Dr. Death. Im worried they went Hollywood, said a high-ranking Detroit police official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the investigation and simmering resentment in the streets. As the black population grew, so did black frustration over poor housing and rock-fisted police. And during our conversation, he referred to himself in the third personGeoffrey Fieger. The title is derived from the California penal code for murder: 187. Sometimes they come in a Crown Victoria with only a defibrillator and a blanket, because there are no other units available. That night, she was murdered by the very people meant to "protect" and "serve" her. He is charged with involuntary manslaughter and careless discharge of a. On October 4, 2011, a Wayne County grand jury indicted Officer Joseph Weekley for involuntary manslaughter and reckless endangerment with a gun. Was it inevitable, as the doctor said, that abject poverty would lead to Aiyanas death and so many others? It is not protocol. The house on the other side is in much the same state. Bagpipes played and the rain fell. The prisoner has not incurred any serious misconducts while in prison. and Weekley for the unlawful use of excessive force. Both sons now sit in urns on her mantel.Chaise lived on the other side of the Chrysler complex. Aiyana Mo'Nay Stanley Jones (July 20, 2002 - May 16, 2010), was a seven-year-old girl from the East Side of Detroit, Michigan who was shot and killed during a raid conducted by the Detroit Police Department's Special Response Team on May 16, 2010. Im stuck. Until there wasnt. The illiteracy, child poverty, and unemployment rates hover around 50 percent. On Thursday, a settlement was made in the lawsuit that amounted to $8.25 being paid out. Lil James brought along a .357 Magnumat the behest of Jones, Detective Williams testified, because Jones was afraid someone would try to steal his diamond Cartier glasses.. Owens got there first and shot JeRean clear through the chest with Lil James gun. Theyd not been tabulated for four years. In 2019, Jones' family agreed to an $8.5 million wrongful death lawsuit settlement against the city of Detroit in connection with the raid. His retrial began in September 2014. [32][33] Allison Howard was sentenced to two years of probation in July 2013, and fined $2,000. Fieger responded by saying he does not have the supposed video,[57] which he claims was made by the A&E Network reality show The First 48. Weekley left the courtroom through a private door. Defense attorney Steve Fishman said prosecutors were courageous by closing the case. The whole country knew it, and the whole country laughed. It was all for the cameras. On Friday, Hathaway dismissed a lesser second charge, of reckless use of a firearm. The Kilpatrick scandal, combined with the murder rate, spurred the newly elected mayor, Dave Bingan NBA Hall of Famerto fire Police Chief James Barrens last year and replace him with Warren Evans, the Wayne County sheriff. But if it wasnt for them, the city population would have sunk further than it did. So bad is it for Detroits children that Education Secretary Arne Duncan said last year, I lose sleep over that one.. People are drinking. The family of a 7-year-old who was fatally shot during a botched raid in 2010 is suing Detroit police, alleging officers lied about how she was killed as part of a cover-up. She was only a baby, man. The beavers disappeared from the river around 1930. He failed to report. Weekley still is charged with careless discharge of a firearm causing death in the May 2010 shooting, which happened as police executed a search warrant for a murder suspect.

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